More on MySpace's Open Development Platform

As we’ve already noted, MySpace plans to hold a meeting for developers interested in building applications for the No. 1 social network. MySpace CTO Aber Whitcombtold us the company expects about 250 developers to show up to learn about the new development platform.

GigaOM: How will the development process work?

Whitcomb: After the meeting tomorrow night all developers will have a month to build and test their applications using the APIs. We will make our internal developers accessible through blogs, forums and maybe even IM. End users should expect to see applications in about a month.

Q: How does this relate to OpenSocial?

A: As you know, we worked with Google to develop OpenSocial, so the platform is made up of three APIs — primarily Open Social and extensions we’ve added to make applications standardize inside MySpace, access friends lists and get data that’s available on public profiles if users gave permission to share that data.

Q: How will developers monetize the apps created for MySpace?

A: There are five places an end user might see an application: Each application will have its own profile page; it can be seen on a user’s home page; a user can see the application on a page that controls their own profile; in a widget gallery; and on a canvas page, which is the primary place to control an application. MySpace hosts the canvas page, and that’s where developers will have the opportunity to monetize their widgets. Users won’t see the canvas page until they install the apps, and the advertising will have to follow a few basic guidelines such as not including copyrighted material, offering illegal services, etc.